So He Won't Break
by I'd-Rather-Be-A-Winchester
Summary: Sam and Dean are trapped in a motel by a freak (though non-supernatural) storm. The brothers are faced with a revelation that may change their relationship forever.


SO HE WON'T BREAK

Summary: Dean and Sam are stuck in their motel room by a freak (although non-supernatural) storm that rages outside. Soon, the brothers get bored, and restless, a combination that sparks a revelation that changes the relationship between the two brothers for good.

UPDATE: Edited a little bit and made it a one-shot.

AN: Will be a two-shot. Also, I did not have it betaed because I wanted to post it before I lost my nerve and to get myself started. Gotta start somewhere right? First posted fanfic ever, btw. Be gentle.

Disclaimer: I do not own any Supernatural characters, items, or story lines featured in this story; they all belong to Kripke and the CW.

Dean couldn't even remember what town they ended up in. He had been too busy arguing with Sam over whether they should stop for the night or not, when it was only 4:30 or so in the afternoon and Sam and Dean had just spent the last couple of hours holed up in some filthy highway diner looking for some new hunts.

But Sam, for one reason or another, maybe because of his nightmares keeping him up at night, perhaps because of his recently dislocated shoulder still bothering him, or maybe because Dean had been annoying him since sunrise, had forgotten to check the weather. Usually, neither Sam nor Dean bothered much with the weather, unless they were down in Florida during the hurricane season, or passing through the mountains during the winter, but this summer in Indiana had brought a lot of raging thunderstorms with the oncoming heat that even Dean wouldn't drive through in his 'baby'.

So, it happened that they left the diner with no forewarning and after a couple of hours of driving hit a storm that made Dean grip the steering wheel until his knuckles whitened. Sam had begun pointing out motel signs along the highway, becoming so obnoxious about it that Dean had swerved across the nearly abandoned highway and into the full parking lot of the motel before Sam could so much as grip the door handle and curse his brother out.

After Dean attained their room, the last available one, he and Sam dragged their duffle bags through the storm and stomped into their motel room. Dean had grunted at Sam and headed to the shower while Sam stood in the doorway and stared at the somewhat familiar décor, trying to figure out why he seemed to remember it.

Now, Dean lay across the bed on his stomach, his chin resting on a pillow, clicking through the channels. Sam sat at the small table in front of the window, clicking rapidly on his laptop and glancing every so often at the shifting shadows through the blinds. The storm could be heard outside as if gearing up for a race, revving its engine with all intents and purposes of racing through town blowing chaos in its wake.

"Hey," Dean snapped. "Could you type with your gigantor fingers quieter?"

"No, Dean" Sam didn't even look up.

"Asshole." Dean viciously pressed the UP channel button, trying to make it click as loudly as Sam's keyboard. The TV screen beamed out a chiaroscuro of colors across Dean's face as it raced through channels at lightning speed. Dean's eyes were starting to glaze over when, with a loud pop, the TV sent out one last burst of color and darkened entirely. Dean reared back, blinking the colors out of his eyes. Sam groaned at almost the same moment and turned to look at his brother.

"Internet's down."

"Yeah, the TV just died and tried to take me with it." Dean groaned, rubbing his eyes as he sat up onto his knees. "At least the lights are still-"

A louder pop this time and the room darkened. Only the brief flashes of lightening that made it through the slits of the closed blinds illuminated the brothers and the room as they both stilled, eyes meeting in the dark as their pupils adjusted. Sam had stood up at the sound of the electricity going off and now towered over his brother who knelt on the bed, thigh muscles tense and coiled, ready to spring.

The brothers listened. Their eyes never strayed from the other, each looking for the first sign of a sound caught, unnatural and dangerous, more than the storm raging out in the night. When no sound other than the storm reached their ears, the brothers slid their gazes from each other, Dean first, his chin following the movement of his eyes as his gaze swept to the floor looking for his boots. "I'm going to check on Baby."

Sam sucked in a breath and Dean's shoulders tensed but Sam remained silent as Dean located his boots and laced them onto his feet. Sam turned to his laptop and shut it down, darkening the room further. By the time the laptop's screen went dark Dean was at the door and Sam looked at him. "I'll get the other flashlights." Was all he said and he went out the door, without his coat, barely shutting it before the wind managed to rip it out of his hands.

Sam felt his way to his duffle bag on the other bed and fished the flashlight out with only a few moments of fumbling. Switching it on, bulb carefully pointed away from his face, Sam aimed the light around the room, pausing on the darker corners, and even brushing the edges of the duvets on the beds, skimming over the bottomless darkness under the beds. A small smirk flickered across Sam's face, remembering childhood fears, real and imagined, that had never fully disintegrated under the weight of adulthood. Sam tilted his head toward the window, toward his brother. There were some fears that were bolstered by the advent of adulthood.

Sam made his way to the window, edging around a chair and inserting two fingers between the middle blinds. Sam barely moved them aside, catching only a glimpse of his brother at the trunk, before he let the blinds slip back into place. Sighing, he went to the bathroom and gathered the remaining dry towels and set them at the table.

Only a few minutes later Dean struggled back into the room, dumping a wet duffle bag onto the floor and almost slipping on the tile set just inside the door. Sam lobbed a towel at his head and Dean caught it, grimacing and shaking water out of his hair like a dog.

"Dude," Sam complained, bringing up an arm as if to ward off a blow.

"Don't be a pussy." Dean snapped and lugged the now damp towel at his brother who caught it in his hand, causing the end to snap in the air as emphatically as Dean's voice had just done.

Sam pursed his lips but said nothing as he grabbed the second towel and tossed it, a little more forcefully than the first, to his brother. Tossing the wet towel into the bathroom, Sam knelt and started to rummage through the damp duffle bag as Dean tried to wring out most of the water in his clothes into the towel.

"Ah," Sam huffed as he pulled out four large candles. Turning swiftly, he set one on the table, one on the plant divider between the door and the room proper, one on the TV set, and one on the small nightstand in between the beds. He lit the one on the nightstand with a lighter from his pocket and then quickly retraced his steps.

The room became friendlier and more unsettling at once, the candle flames causing odd shadows to dance across nearly every surface in the room. Dean could dimly see himself in the mirror on the closet doors across the room as he ran the towel down his jeans. One half of his face obscured in shadow, the other illuminated in the dim light from the candle on the divider. Dean stilled, lost in the dichotomous image of himself displayed on the mirror, something that had been pre conceived in his mind, subconsciously, the good and bad of himself, the duality of his nature.

Sam picked up the candle on the divider, jostling Dean out of his reverie and slid a paper plate under the candle. Dean blinked and noticed paper plates under the other candles already and wondered how far gone he had been to not notice his hulk of a brother moving around the room again.

"Get some clothes out of my bag, will 'ya?"

Again, Sam remained silent, merely shuffling over to his brother's duffle and picking clothes at random. He handed his brother the clothes and casually turned back to the table as Dean stripped out of his wet clothes and wrangled on his dry ones. The dampness of his skin, especially his chest and back which had been protected against the rain by a flimsy cotton T-shirt, did not make the transition smooth and Dean gritted his teeth in annoyance as he finally tugged his shirt down over his belly and kicked his boots aside.

"We have any food?"

A mere five hours into their forced confinement by the storm, Dean was almost literally climbing up the walls. Balancing on his hands, Dean had propelled his lower body up and resting against the wall as he balanced on his head. "Hey, Sammy. Hey! Time me."

By the time seven hours of their confinement passed Sam had seen Dean vacillate from one side of the emotional spectrum to the other, several times. Like a pendulum on crack – if pendulums could be on crack.

After Dean's failed attempt to balance on his head, Dean had snagged one of Sam's books from his duffel and now lay quietly on the bed, reading by flashlight. Sam lay on his own bed, book in hand. Though he found the book interesting, Sam could not but help to be distracted by the seemingly unnatural stillness of his brother.

Dean lay on his stomach, book in one hand, flashlight in the other. The candle on the partition in front of the door cast eerie flickering shadows on Dean's face that were banished by the light of the flashlight every time Dean directed it to an opposite page. Though the flashlight's beam was strong, the candlelight was weak and so most of Dean was cast in stark shadow except for his face.

If Sam tilted his head a certain way he could see the reflection of the candlelight in Dean's electric green eyes.

Dean's eyes moved, shifting to the opposite page. Sam shifted his own gaze back to his book a rueful smile playing across his face even through his concern. A wave of deja vu infused nostalgia passed over him.

If there was anyone Sam had studied and wanted to be like in his relatively young life it was Dean. Dean, his awesome big brother, lady killer, superb hunter, a talented mechanic with a little too much love for mullet rock – all these things Sam had thought about his brother. If Dean was doing something, saying anything, acting any which way, little Sammy was sure to do it, say it, and copy as best he could.

Sam's earnest quest to be like his brother tapered off a bit when Sam entered his teens. Now in his late twenties, Sam's hero worship had softened to an admiration for an equal, though in some ways Dean still caused Sam to feel like the awestruck little brother he had once been.

Sam slid his gaze back to Dean and found Dean's eyes staring straight back at him. Dean dropped the flashlight, rose to his knees and slid off the bed in one quick movement. Clutching the book by the spine, Dean's gaze never strayed from Sam's face except for one quick moment when Dean swiveled on one heel, threw back his arm and hurled the book at the wall. Dean's gaze returned to Sam's before the book even reached the floor.

Sam lay with his book on his chest, his fingers hovering over the open cover as if trying to decide whether to stay on the book or raise themselves in self-defense.

For a fleeting moment, Sam saw his father in Dean, his father was Dean, and young Sam was waiting, wondering, dreading, if this was the moment. This was the moment John would finally hit him.

'What the fuck are you staring at?' Dean growled.

Sam sucked in a breath, Dean's belligerent ire shining through his icy demeanor, settling Sam's nerves. This wasn't the anger that Dean let show sometimes after hell, when hell was plaguing him. Nor was this the focused, predatory rage Dean exuded when hunting a monster with particularly nasty proclivities. This was Dean's 'I'm upset and want to throw a manly tantrum' deadly calm that Sam often enjoyed igniting in his own younger brother way.

John's image seemed to melt away from Dean at this realization and Sam shifted up against the headboard, stretching his tense limbs as he did so. Dean _had _hit Sam but never when they were younger (sparring not counting) and only in the recent past as a mutual clash of aggression from both sides. John had never hit Sam for that matter. Not Sam anyway.

'Nothing'. Sam finally replied.

A muscle in Dean's face twitched so obviously Sam could see it in the dim light. Sam felt himself tense again and a sudden suspicion entered his mind.

'Did you take something?'

'What do you mean nothing?'

Sam pursed his lips as he leaned forward.

'You took something, didn't you?'

Dean's shoulders relaxed and he tossed Sam his trademark cocky smirk complete with a shrug and spreading his arms wide as if to say 'look how awesome I am – what was your question, wait I don't care'. Or at least that's how Sam had interpreted it all these years.

'You took something, dude. You're never this sensitive – or emotional.' Sam stood up as the words left his mouth. Dean tensed again, his arms falling closer to his sides although he kept them loose against his body. Sam remained standing, though he made no attempt to get any closer.

'I hope you didn't break the spine of my book.' Sam said, casual as anything.

A flicker of acute remorse crosses Dean's features and Sam settled on his heels, putting his hands in his pockets, and nodded knowingly. 'Right, so you're not high?"

Dean offered an indifferent shrug. 'A little high, a little low. Who cares?"

"Dean . . ."

"Sammy, I just -"

Dean sucked in a breath as his voice abruptly lapsed into silence. Shaking his head vigorously as if to clear it Dean brought a hand to his forehead and looked at Sam. A slowly widening grin spread across Dean's mouth and he let out a breathy laugh.

"Okay, Sammy, you caught me."

"Dean, why -"

"Why? Are you serious? All the shit we've been through and you've never-"

Dean trailed off, gaze searching Sam's face.

Sam returned Dean's attention with equal force, the lines along his mouth and forehead slowly disappearing as the muscles in his face reacted to the tension leaving his body. A realization grabbed hold of Sam and shook him in its jaws. Sam felt limp with it.

"You've done this before. Not just painkillers or . . . sometimes alcohol isn't enough is it?"

The studied ease in which Dean stood vanished. Shoulders drew back, weight shifted to the balls of his feet; but the defensiveness did not reach Dean's face. His expression open, Dean visibly relaxed his body and sank onto his bed.

Sam remained standing.

"Sometimes it's hard, Sammy. This . . . this is a bad trip. Probably a bad batch Hell, I'm lucky I'm not . . ."

Sam sank abruptly onto his own bed. Resting his palms on the covers Sam lowered his head.

"I'm listening." He whispered, when he noticed his brother's voice no longer tentatively probing the gap between them.

"This isn't normal, Sammy. I mean, I don't usually do this, but even so - this isn't how I react."

"To what?"

"What? Oh, doesn't . . . doesn't matter Sammy. I'll throw it out. This isn't really . . ." Dean huffed another laugh and rubbed his face with one hand.

"Yeah, I've done LSD, E, what have you, just a little though, like once. Never meth - or heroin. There was this one bad night with a bad crowd and some curiosity about crack but after that, never. Painkillers, yeah, but, I mean, you know, Sammy."

Dean paused and gazed at his brother, eyes pleading. Sam did not look up, not at Dean's words, not at Dean's silence and for a moment the only sound in the room was a soft rasping noise as Dean rubbed his hands nervously on his jeans.

"Sammy." Dean tried to force his usual authority into his voice but all that came out was a weak plea in the form of his brother's name.

Sam winced.

Dean cleared his throat, coughed into his hand and settled both hands back onto his thighs, rubbing the denim of his jeans briskly as if his hand were cold.

"Sammy-"

"Dean."

Sam raised his head and met Dean's eyes with his own. Dean stilled completely except for the tiniest almost imperceptible vibration of anticipation shuddering through his whole body.

Sam bit his lip to keep it from curling up in disgust. He was like a damn dog. An overgrown, eager puppy.

In the next moment, Sam nearly choked on his sorrow - almost overshadowing his disgust.

"Dean, why do this?"

"I don't." Dean said earnestly. "Not really. This is a bad trip, thats all."

"You mean the drugs -"

"The drugs, the hunt. This freakish storm. Hell"

Sam raised his head, shock spreading through him. Dean _never _mentioned hell.

"Motherfucking hell, Sammy. Dad dying, you leaving. Mom dying. It's _all _a bad trip."

The air around the brothers seemed to freeze. Dean's voice halted, as if the sound of his voice itself froze with the air. The brothers gazed at each other, all the years and the trials and the general fuckery of their lives passed through each of their minds, as if they were one, with one thought.

Dean broke the tense silence. "Sometimes- often, it's a bad trip - it's bad . . . can be . . ." He trailed off, his gaze wandering from Sam's as if his thoughts had taken a detour. Then his gaze snapped back to his brother's. "Not _everything._" He said with conviction. "Not every time. Not all the time. Just sometimes it overtakes me. Like this time, with everything and all these shitty hunts. I keep feeling like like we're fucking up all the time now. Not getting on a hunt fast enough, not figuring out the monster of the week fast enough. People keep dying. We keep losing. It feels like we keep losing.

"And hell. Hell. Sometimes the nightmares don't stop. Sometimes it haunts me during the day. And then all the shit we've done - the Apocalypse . . . Carthage . . . Detroit. I keep going over and over what we did and every time I come up with different ways we could've done something . . . to stop it.

"It all comes down on me, Sammy. I carry it. I'll probably always carry it.

"So, sometimes . . . I _need _a break.

"This, _this _Sammy, " Dean gestured to himself and the room around them. "This is a bad trip. That's all."

As he spoke, Dean's gaze strayed from Sam, as if distracted by their surroundings, although the room remained dim with candlelight and the only sound besides Dean's voice was the reverberating roar of the thunder which had been slowly fading into the distance as the storm sonorously moved on.

However, Dean's gaze always traveled back to Sam's, even when he seemed the most faraway. Now, as Dean's voice yet again faded into silence, Sam turned his own gaze from his brother.

"That's all." Dean insisted, as Sam looked away from him.

"That's all." Sam repeated. "That's all?"

Abruptly Sam stood, his fists clenched. Dean reared back and scrambled off of his bed, before catching himself and settling on the balls of his feet again, this time his hands loose but ready. There was a wary gleam in his eyes, but also a spark of mad glee that Sam instinctively knew, well hoped, was a result of whatever Dean had taken.

"Are we going to fight, Sammy?" Dean asked the question with a cocky grin, but his gaze never stayed on Sam, as if avoiding direct eye contact.

"I'm not going to fight you while you're high, Dean"

"You couldn't fight me if I was sober, either." And there was that arrogant viciousness, that rarely seen resentment that Sam knew existed but had never openly acknowledged.

"Dean . . . I think . . . you should . . ." Sam breathed heavily as his ability to produce words drained away. Dean smirked at him, as if Sam's stuttering retort was a victory.

"I'm going for a walk." Sam said without inflection.

Dean actually paled, glancing at the closed curtains and the muted light show the lightening was putting on for the entire county. The rumble of thunder was farther away now, but still loud enough for vibrations from the sound to travel through walls and floors.

"Why would you-" Dean started, and then Sam was walking toward the door, flinging it open and struggling through the threshold against the wind and rain. With a burst of anger, he slammed the door behind him, shutting Dean motionless inside.

"Sammy?"

Sam walked through the storm, shoulders bent forward, head down against the wind spattered rain, his breath coming in harsh pants. He walked pass Baby in her parking space, now covered in a blue tarp by her neurotic and loving owner. Her currently high, too honest owner.

Sam shook his head, his hair slapping his cheeks wetly as he raised a hand to block the rain from his eyes. He headed in a straight line across the parking lot, toward the ragged stand of trees behind the motel. Lightning flashed as he reached the treeline and Sam had a brief flashback to the time he was killed by a lightning strike. Then his overwrought brain jumped to the dangers he had heard as a child about standing near trees during a thunderstorm. He couldn't remember whether it had been an old wives' tale or not.

Sam reached the foremost tree in his path and brushed the bark with his fingers as he passed it and trudged further into the woods. The motel was a singular building on this stretch of the highway which featured dense woods on either side. For all Sam knew, he could keep walking for days before he hit another highway, road, or even town.

Sam stopped under a particularly large tree, its branches dense enough, and its neighbor's branches dense enough, to where Sam could stand upright without being blinded by the rain. The rain still reached him through the trees, but here it was almost soothing, the thunder and lightning merely background events to the soft song of the rain falling through leaves.

The storm was dying down, anyhow, Sam could sense in it in the pressure in the air. In the few minutes he had been out the lightning had become less intense and the thunder was now a low rumble in the distance. Though it still rained heavily, it looked like the storm that had kept Dean and Sam in the motel might soon move on or dissipate.

Sam rested his forehead against the tree trunk. His grey t-shirt was plastered to his skin, his jeans heavy with rainwater, and his shoes squelched everytime he shifted his weight. Briefly, Sam wondered whether they had been ruined, or if blasting them with a hair dryer would save them. They had been expensive. Of course, they had been bought with credit card fraud. Every stitch on his back, since he was a child, except for his years at Stanford, had been bought with stolen or hustled money.

Sam groaned and lifted his forehead from the tree trunk, shifting around and resting his back against it, leaning the back of his head against the trunk. He stared up at the leaves, his eye half shut against the rainwater that still made its way through the dense leaf cover.

"Sammy?"

Sam had heard Dean approach long before he spoke. Usually cat like, Dean stumbled now toward Sam, stopping a few feet from his brother. Sam could hear him come to a halt, hear his breathing, which came in harsh gasps as if he had been running.

"I thought you went toward the road at first."

Sam almost rolled his eyes, but then remembered how high his brother was. Whatever Dean took had really whammied him, especially for him to have confessed so many _feelings _to Sam, in one evening. Dean probably wouldn't feel obligated to talk to Sam about what was going on with him for years to come.

"Do you know what time it is?"

Sam lowered his head to stare directly at his brother. Dean stood uneasily near a tree opposite Sam's resting post, almost touching the bark with one arm. He was continually shifting his weight back and forth, almost swaying, his arms loose at his sides, his hands clenching and unclenching.

"What?" Sam breathed. He glanced at his right wrist, the usual spot for a watch, if he wore one, which he had not. "No."

"Its 4:30. In the morning. Why aren't we sleeping?"

Sam blinked, his bewilderment showing clearly in his slightly slack jaw. "_What?_" He shook his head slowly before Dean could respond. "Dean, what the fuck did you _take_?"

Dean made a huffing sound, waving his hand back and forth in the air. "Doesn't matter. I flushed it out."

"Dean-"

"I don't think I've been asleep at this exact time in years. You ever think of that, Sammy? Everyone else is asleep, but we're always awake."

Sam let out a breath and felt a muscle in his jaw began to twitch. "You'd never say these things if you weren't high."

"Yeah, I know. I know that's fucked up too. You might think I've never realized, Sammy, but I have. I've known, since we were kids."

Sam pushed himself off the tree and walked a few feet away, his fingers gripping his temples as if to hold all the thoughts fighting to burst out of his head. "I can't take this." He muttered, almost to himself. "I can't take this."

"I sometimes think I should've just taken you and started somewhere new. Like, when you were little. Or younger at least. Hell, I was eighteen when you were fourteen, I could've gotten custody of you. I could've taken you out of the life. Taken myself out of the life with you."

Sam stopped, sank to his knees, a burst of air forced out of his throat that sounded very similar to a sob.

"I don't know why I didn't. I almost did, when I found you in that cabin, when you ran away, remember? Dad had been so angry, and drunk, and he . . . he never did that before. And I kept thinking, 'I'm not gonna bring Sammy back to this.' But I did, didn't I?"

A sound crawled up out of Sam's throat, almost animal in intensity, and he covered his face with his hands, bending forward until his forehead almost touched the ground.

Dean walked up beside his brother and sat on the wet, spongy ground. He didn't touch him, but sat close, and just looked at his brother until Sam raised his head to meet Dean's gaze.

"Sometimes I'm glad I didn't. Sometimes I can't regret it enough. But I can't tell, sometimes, Sammy, whether you would regret it. You left once, on your own. You wanted out. You got out, and then I dragged you back, except I know in my brain," Dean brushed his own forehead with the back of his thumb. "That Yellow Eyes would've killed Jess anyway, or got you some other way. But here," Dean put his palm over his heart. "I'm never going to believe that."

Sam shoved his face against his brother's shoulder and broke, his breath catching in his throat between sobs. Dean remained upright, one hand bracing himself against the ground, and the other curling into Sam's hair. Sam simply cried into his brother's shoulder as Dean simply stroked Sam's hair, in a way he hadn't done since Sam had been a child.

"Dean," Sam gasped. Dean made a shushing noise, leaning forward and bringing his other hand to grip Sam around the shoulders. Sam quieted, continuing to cry with softer and softer sobs as the force of his emotion left his already overtaxed body.

With a suddenness that startled Dean, Sam lifted his head. "Dean," He tried again, and paused to wipe fiercely at his eyes. He reached out and clutched Dean's face between his hands. "You listen to me. Whatever has happened, however its happened, I do not regret being with my big brother. When I get out, if I get out, its only if you're getting out with me. You understand, big brother."

Dean was silent, mouth open in shock, and Sam shook him a little. "Do you understand, Dean?"

"Yes." Dean whispered. Gently he pried Sam's hands off of him and held them in his own. "I can't just turn this off, though."

Sam furrowed his brow. "The drugs? I know that, we'll just wait until you come down from your high-just don't do it anymore-"

"No. Not that. This feeling." Dean palmed his heart once more.

Sam leaned back, running a hand through his damp and tangled hair. Usually smooth, his hair caught at his fingers and Sam tiredly tried to untangle himself. Laughing softly, Dean reached a hand to help, and by the time Sam's hand was free they were both laughing.

"You need a trim." Dean said.

"Yeah, well, so do you."

Dean let out a chuckle at that and then both brother's fell silent once more. Until Sam, sitting up straighter, turned himself toward his brother and spoke. "Listen, Dean. I get that its going to be hard, that everything's not just going to magically change because you've . . . finally confessed. While on drugs, yes, but they're real, right?"

"Yeah . . ." Dean breathed softly. He lowered his gaze to his boots. "I'm never taking this shit, again. Fucking nancy making drugs."

Sam huffed a laugh and clapped his brother on the shoulder. "Well, maybe it was actually a good thing. When would you have ever told me all these things otherwise, huh?"

"Fucking never, Sammy."

"Exactly. I needed to hear it, though."

Dean met Sam's eyes and then grinned sheepishly. "If you want, you can unload your emotional baggage on me, now. Not like you don't all the time anyway, but maybe the really nasty stuff, huh? Don't pretend you don't have those too."

"I do, but I'm not gonna do that where you might cry. Me crying is one thing, but I've only seen you cry at the end of the world. It gives me the heebie jeebies."

"Well, maybe, I'll just start crying all the time now." Dean groaned as he stood up, Sam following suit. "If it annoys you so much."

Sam laid a hand on his brother's shoulder. "It never annoyed me, Dean. Joking aside, you know it's okay to cry, right?"

Dean scoffed. "Maybe for other men, Sammy, but not me. I'm too manly. It might be failing, but someone has to do it."

"You know what, maybe I will fight you, Dean."

Dean threw back his and let out a loud laugh. Walking ahead of Sam, he turned briefly to look back at his brother. "Anytime, brother. Gotta keep you sharp."

Sam just shook his head and grinned and then joined his brother to walk back to their motel room.

Once in the room, the brother's stripped out their wet clothes and into their equivalent of pajamas, which consisted of t-shirts, jeans, socks but no shoes, and their favorite piece hidden under their pillows.

"Hey, don't you want to just head out?" Dean asked, sitting for the moment at the end of his bed. He was the first dressed, and had picked up the book he had thrown and now sat thumbing the pages back and forth restlessly.

Sam groaned as he crawled onto his bed, his book on the nightstand, his piece under his pillow. "Dean, I think I could actually sleep for a couple of hours. How about it?"

Dean turned to look at his still made bed, his piece lying on the nightstand within reach. "I guess I should. I'm kind of tired. Probably gonna crash from this high soon anyway."

Tossing the book on the nightstand, Dean flung back the covers and plopped into bed. Taking his favorite handgun from the nightstand he shoved it under his pillow, his right hand still on the grip. Scrunching his pillow for the optimum plushiness, Dean settled down and finally looked at his brother only to find him also curled on his side, watching him.

Sam smiled at him, cocking an eyebrow. "You all settled in? Can I turn the lights off now?"

"I want the lights on." Dean muttered.

"Right, okay." Sam frowned a little. "I'm going to be checking your stuff for drugs from now on, you know that right?"

"You're a douche."

"Yeah, well, you love me." Sam said cheekily.

Dean was silent a moment, then in almost a whisper, "Yeah, I do."

Sam just smiled. He wasn't going to tease him about this.

The brothers were silent for a few seconds, and then Dean huffed in annoyance. "This is the motel we stayed in when we first saw Lisa again."

"I know." Sam said quietly. "I realized when we got back from the woods."

Sam waited for Dean to say anything else, but silence reigned, and he could only hope that maybe his brother went to sleep. Not long after, Sam followed him into slumber.

The brothers woke up together, facing each other, the mid-morning sun streaming bright and bracing through the curtains. Dean mumbled a curse word and blinked his eyes, shoving his pillow over his head. He still held his sidearm in a death grip, which now rested on top of pillow, thankfully pointed away from Sam. As for Sam, he sat up and diligently moved his piece from under his pillow to rest on the nightstand. Leaning across the divide between their beds, Sam cautiously tapped Dean's wrist and he released the gun from his grip without a word. Sam daintily took it from him and laid it beside his own.

"You're gonna shoot your eye out, kid." Dean deadpanned and then giggled.

"Please tell me you're still not high." Sam groaned.

"_No." _Dean sounded insulted. "I'm half asleep! And it was a perfect opening."

"I hate that movie."

"You hate all the good movies."

"I'm not even going to reward that with a response."

"You just did." Dean muttered and grumpily tossed his pillow on the other side of his bed. Sitting up with yet another groan, Dean rubbed his eyes vigorously.

"Coffee."

"I'm getting it, Princess." Sam rolled his eyes as he set up the cheap coffee maker on the table. "We have Maxwell House dark roast or Folgers dark roast."

"Max. Folgers is shit."

"Okay, then."

The brothers quietly went their morning routine, Dean breaking the comfortable silence only to note the time, 11:30 in the morning, and Sam to yell at Dean to get out of the shower to remind him that "I'm checking your stuff for drugs, I warned you," and then calling Dean gross through the bathrooms door as he moved a veritable pile of Busty Asian Beauties from Dean's bag.

Dean just laughed at him when he got out of the shower and soon the brothers were sitting at the table, drinking the cheap coffee and discussing where they should go next.

"You mentioned Lisa last night." Sam said suddenly, all nonchalant and giving Dean his best innocent look.

Dean stilled but did nothing more than sip his coffee.

"We could always go check on her in Michigan."

Dean grunted.

"Just to see that she's okay."

Dean grunted again.

"I think that's a good idea, actually. We could also see if there's any hunts nearby. I mean, if there's any monsters near her and Ben . . ."

Dean faced his brother and narrowed his eyes. Sam cocked an eyebrow and met his brother's eyes boldly.

There was a brief moment where Sam felt himself teetering on the edge of something, teetering on the edge of falling back into old patterns, nothing changing, and he could nothing about it because it all depended on his brother. Sam kept his gaze steady and tried to send all the love and trust he felt, and acceptance.

Dean finally moved, though it was only him cocking his own eyebrow, but he gave an accepting nod, staring right into Sam's eyes and Sam couldn't help the relieved breath that left his body in a great whoosh.

Dean smiled slightly at that, then his expression turned serious. "Sam, I'm only going to say this once."

Sam straightened and set his hands palm down on the table, his whole body at attention to his brother.

"Everything I said last night was true. Every word."

Sam nodded cautiously when Dean paused for a response.

"Don't think I'm going to say things like that so easily again."

Another nod in confirmation. Sam could've guessed that.

"And . . ." Dean looked away, as if trying to find the words on the curtains or the walls. Finding none, he merely shook his head and turned to face his brother again.

"Sometimes it's a good trip." He said simply.

Sam grinned, wide and free and let out a little laugh. "Same here."

Dean smiled back, then stood, taking one last gulp of his coffee. "On to Michigan, then, brother?"

"Yeah," Sam stood up and finished his coffee. "Michigan it is."


End file.
